Australian authorities confirmed Wednesday the discovery of a radioactive capsule that went missing in January while being transported in the west of the country, leading to the declaration of a health alert in a radius of hundreds of kilometers.
Western Australia’s Emergency Services Minister Stephen Dawson said the cesium-137 capsule was found 50 kilometers from the town of Newman and stressed that «search teams have found the needle in the haystack».
«I want to emphasize that this is an extraordinary result,» he said, as reported by the Australian television network ABC. The capsule was located by a team from the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organization and the Department of Fire and Emergency Services.
Australia issued the alert after the capsule went missing between January 11 and 16 after falling from the truck transporting it from a Rio Tinto mine to the city of Perth. The loss was reported about a week later, on January 25.
The capsule, six millimeters in diameter and eight millimeters high, is used in mining equipment and can generate high doses of radiation if handled incorrectly, so the authorities demanded that no one touch it and that, if possible, they should keep at least five meters away.
Source: (EUROPA PRESS)
